1. Cut your chicken up with a very sharp knife if you’ve bought whole chickens. Here’s a handy video from Youtube if you’re new to this. Also, you can have your butcher cut the chicken up for you.

2. In a large bowl marinate the chicken in 2 cups of buttermilk and refrigerate overnight. I didn’t measure this out — I just made sure the chicken was covered in buttermilk. When ready to fry, remove chicken from the refrigerator and let sit on the counter for 30 minutes to take the chill off.

3. Preheat your oven to 350F. Stir together and mix the dry ingredients in a very large bowl. In a small bowl, combine 1/8 cup buttermilk and 1/8 cup regular milk. Pour the milk mixture into the flour and stir with a fork until little lumps appear throughout the dry mix.

4. Heat 2 inches of peanut oil in a dutch oven (attach cooking thermometer to the side) over medium heat to 365F. Don’t overdo it with the oil — adding more oil lowers the overall temperature.

5. Work in batches of 4 pieces of chicken at a time. Take a piece of chicken from the buttermilk marinade and thoroughly coat with the dry mix, taking care to press into the meat to adhere the coating. This will give your chicken plenty of crispy coating. If you just dip your chicken in the coating, the coating will fall off during the frying process, so really press that coating into your chicken.

6. When you have your 4 pieces of chicken coated with the dry mix, add to the oil and cover for 3-5 minutes, checking after 2 minutes that the chicken isn’t getting too brown. You want your chicken to develop a nice medium golden color. Turn your chicken pieces over and cook an additional 2-3 minutes. Monitor your oil temperature to ensure that the chicken doesn’t burn. Repeat steps 5 and 6 with the remaining chicken pieces.

7. Place chicken pieces on a baking sheet and when done frying all the pieces, bake in the oven for 20 minutes or until chicken is cooked through. To test for doneness, poke a fork into a thigh or breast and if the juices run clear, then the chicken is fully cooked.